The Debate about Colour Naming in 19th-Century German Philology

The Debate about Colour Naming in 19th Century German Philology contains eleven essays illustrating the intensity of interest in color naming and categorization that arose in nineteenth-century Germany. The themes of each chapter vary in their emphasis on particular theories that lie behind the "testing" of the color-naming capacities of "primitive people" throughout the world, and which move toward new variants of the doctrine of evolution.

This selection of work directs itself toward the growing field of psychology and the shifting ground on which it was to form the later debates about color naming and categorization. These essays are a fascinating example of the early development of the human sciences and of the interplay among natural science, social science, and ideology.